I tend not to engage in this sort of 'deep' subject but, for those who might have seen the repeat of Olivia Coleman's 'Who Do You Think You Are?' last night on TV, she discovered she was of Indian descent several generations back, so maybe we should all be a little cautious?
Oh how I loathe the expression 'virtue signalling'. Initially a legitimate term for those who loudly declare their 'goodness' without actually doing anything good. Now it seems to have become an insult to be thrown at anybody who even dares to suggest that maybe it might be better to be nicer to other people or to care about the planet. It only ever seems to be used to shut down conversation and to try and shame and silence those who are talking about trying to make the world a nicer place.
@Posy Interestingly enough, just a few months ago on Radio 5 Live, there was a caller who used the word Black when discussing racist attitudes. The presenter, Jim Davidson I think, immediately told the caller that the term black was unacceptable and that he should have used the term " person of colour ".
Jim Davidson was trolling the caller... This is what he considers 'comedy':
“They are protesting, most of them are of colour, you can’t say BAME anymore, that’s offensive as well now.
“Mostly black people and a few young white snowflake birds and other idiots are saying there is no black in the Union Jack and so they took it down and burnt it.”
I've experienced sexism and sectarianism but have no experience at all of racism, haven't even witnessed it, directly. Growing up in Cornwall in the 1970s, the number of non-white locals was vanishingly small and even tourist visitors very rare. Even now, here in rural Devon, you hardly ever meet anyone who isn't white - many of our neighbours come from families that have lived here for generations. People who live in this sort of place, and especially those who have always lived here, have no understanding at all of the issues around racism - we only know what we read about or see on TV and that appears to be reductive. If the BAME community feel that they are not understood by this country, it's not surprising. They're right. There are whole swathes of the population living outside cities who have no idea at all. Some are open minded about people they don't know, but sadly, for many, their view of the issue is formed by the Daily Fail and their ilk, so they start the conversation already defensive and frightened. We won't stop racism in football unless we stop racism in society. 'Football' is not a subset of the population.
Gardening on the edge of Exmoor, in Devon
“It's still magic even if you know how it's done.”
Do you all not think that there are multiple levels to racism?
I know I have simple views, but I think I see two distinct 'things' that are grouped under the same heading.
On one hand you have the nationalistic view, the Empire view, the view that says that we are different from the world in general and that we are in some way better. I would say that, again simplistically, that this is more an upper class thing that was then engendered in the other classes. The labourer on the farm didn't give a stuff about that Indian from Calcutta - but the serviceman in the army did. Jingoism takes over. The Empire was 'good' because we had better values than the others - that justified the Empire. 'We' were taking enlightenment to the world. They were inferior. This becomes/became the institutional racism that we still see - and we see not only here but around the world. The insane nationalistic view.
On the other hand you have the base level resentment racism. This we see across all groups - but mainly the poor. I don't think any class or group is immune from this, but it affected the poor more since the end of the war. When anyone's livelihood is threatened they resent the threat and its source. After the wars, manpower (Shaun) was lacking, so it was imported. By virtue of what was 'lost', the imported manpower was at the lower social-economic end. They were brought into areas where the labour was required and in some cases supplanted the original population. They were perceived as taking the jobs and housing. Would resentment be a natural reaction to this? To me, yes. I think if we now took an 'ethnic' area and imported groups from somewhere else and supplanted some of that 'ethnic' population, I would say that they (the ethnic group) would have a valid reason to feel resentment. This resentment morphs with time - the child resents because the parent resented - they are taught that resentment and resent because of the perceived damage done to their parents. The reason for the child's resentment is then similar but not the same. Did we all not see a bit of this type of resentment racism in the Brexit vote? The EU was allowing 'foreigners' to take our jobs. Our livelihood was threatened. I wonder how many people voted to leave based on this resentment who themselves had come from migrant stock? The Trump '..I'm going to build a wall to keep migrants out..', when he's the product of migration, type view. The migrants in this resentment view suffer racism in two ways - they inherit the social injustices that have always been a problem for the poorer classes, and also have to suffer the animosity and resentment from the population around them.
How do you stop it? Doesn't it then depend on which part you're trying to tackle? There isn't one way to tackle both elements that I can see. Historically, time sometimes heals the resentment issue. Try to correct the social deprivation in the poor areas (even though the deprivation existed before the migration as well - the migrants were imported into deprived areas)? How long did it take for other large scale migrations into the UK to be assimilated? Education can help when dealing with the Empire view issue. We are no better than anyone else - we all come from the same planet. Can you - or is it even right to - educate people based on a specific social ideology? If it is then you argue that it was right to educate people that the Empire was good. I (think I) recall being taught in school how good the Romans had been for Britain. Did the British tribes think that at the time?
It might have helped if the 'ruling classes' hadn't continually deflected criticism of the inequality in this country away from themselves by creating scapegoats.
Gardening in Central Norfolk on improved gritty moraine over chalk ... free-draining.
But isn't that the way of the world? If you look back at most migrant groups they will have come from somewhere where THEY were the dominant group at one point and saw the world from that perspective. Abuse of one group of Africans by other Africans, abuse of one group of Indians by other Indians - that occurred as much as abuse of those groups within the UK. That was always my argument about the shrinking world - look at those maps about just the tribes in the UK. How many thought they were the top tribe? They fought the others and over time amalgamated and merged. Each tribe thinking they were best and their leaders telling them that and blaming the other tribes for their woes. It's odd to think that those map lines aren't permanent - so why do we focus on the UK? Hopefully our borders will dissolve at some point - and France's and Germany's and we'll finally realise that we're just all people trying to live on a piddly little planet spinning in infinity.
The BIG issue is in those maps. Those borders probably existed down some natural border that split the tribes. No natural border exists anymore. Where those borders morphed over millennia, the world of no natural borders has appeared over the past 100 years. It's the shock of that that we have to get used to. We are all now neighbours.
That may get around the Empire issue or just make the evolving larger groups fight (which has been the way of the shrinking world) - and cause a short term worse Empire view. Would resolving social deprivation not only solve resentment racism but also class resentment? Levelling of access to education, healthcare, employment etc..would that stop the resentment? What would there be to resent apart then from where the migrants settle and the feeling of losing your own local culture? And can you ever stop that when migrations occur?
Personally, I still think that power and isms are too close to call the boundaries. Power uses and manipulates isms as isms to me imply difference and we all know that in difference is energy, money and power.
That doesn't help the poor sod who has to suffer vile abuse because some tw*t, who spend all his hard earnt cash on getting a tan, thinks their target's colour somehow validates them spewing their bile. But, I'm not even convinced these people are necessarily racist - they're just vile trolls who like hurting - and they know colour jibes hurt.
Posts
I tend not to engage in this sort of 'deep' subject but, for those who might have seen the repeat of Olivia Coleman's 'Who Do You Think You Are?' last night on TV, she discovered she was of Indian descent several generations back, so maybe we should all be a little cautious?
“They are protesting, most of them are of colour, you can’t say BAME anymore, that’s offensive as well now.
“Mostly black people and a few young white snowflake birds and other idiots are saying there is no black in the Union Jack and so they took it down and burnt it.”
Watch - Reactions as Jim Davidson publishes video titled 'There's no black in the Union Jack' (thelondoneconomic.com)Gardening in Central Norfolk on improved gritty moraine over chalk ... free-draining.
We won't stop racism in football unless we stop racism in society. 'Football' is not a subset of the population.
“It's still magic even if you know how it's done.”
Gardening in Central Norfolk on improved gritty moraine over chalk ... free-draining.
Gardening in Central Norfolk on improved gritty moraine over chalk ... free-draining.